Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach

Thesis: S.M. in Transportation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2014.

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Chow, William, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Other Authors: John P. Attanucci.
Format: Thesis
Language:eng
Published: Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2014
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/89853
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author Chow, William, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
author2 John P. Attanucci.
author_facet John P. Attanucci.
Chow, William, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
author_sort Chow, William, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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description Thesis: S.M. in Transportation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2014.
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spelling mit-1721.1/898532019-04-12T15:36:09Z Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach Chow, William, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology John P. Attanucci. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Civil and Environmental Engineering. Thesis: S.M. in Transportation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2014. This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections. Cataloged from student-submitted PDF version of thesis. Includes bibliographical references (pages 119-121). Public transit agencies have traditionally relied on manually collected customer surveys to understand travel behavior and customer satisfaction. With formerly manually collected data such as ridership and running times now being automatically collected, there exists an opportunity to simplify surveys using this automatically collected information. This thesis evaluates an online approach to conduct customer surveys at a public transit agency by linking prior trip history into the survey. It also tests the prompted recall survey approach, where the personalized survey displays a prior trip segment and asks about the journey made by the respondent. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA), Boston's public transit agency, was used as a case study to develop a customer panel and test the online survey approach with prompted recall. The research showed that verifying a trip was made in the previous week significantly increased the chances of survey response having an associated trip record. Confirming that a recent trip was made by the respondent increased the rate of matching surveyed journeys to fare transaction data from 26.7% of individuals with no recent trip to 64.2% for individuals with a recent trip. Prompted recall had a slightly higher match rate of 67.3% of individuals, but the rate of partial matches using the prompted recall approach was significantly higher at 88%. Some missed matches may be due to inaccurate or incomplete records in fare transaction records, and solutions to these issues may increase the percentage of matches through the prompted recall approach. This result shows promise for transit agencies that may look to target surveys towards individuals using specific lines or routes. The success of this approach was primarily due to the construction of the survey, which allowed for previous trip records to be analyzed prior to subsequent survey distribution, and therefore should be used as one way to increase the quantity and quality of survey responses. by William Chow. S.M. in Transportation 2014-09-19T19:37:33Z 2014-09-19T19:37:33Z 2014 2014 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/89853 890140130 eng M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission. http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 121 pages application/pdf Massachusetts Institute of Technology
spellingShingle Civil and Environmental Engineering.
Chow, William, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
title Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
title_full Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
title_fullStr Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
title_full_unstemmed Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
title_short Evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
title_sort evaluating online surveys for public transit agencies using a prompted recall approach
topic Civil and Environmental Engineering.
url http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/89853
work_keys_str_mv AT chowwilliamsmmassachusettsinstituteoftechnology evaluatingonlinesurveysforpublictransitagenciesusingapromptedrecallapproach